Electronic commerce has been increasingly common since the advent of the Internet. This development has led to the increase in the available forms of electronic payments. For example, electronic payments can be facilitated by a variety of payment companies. Examples of payment companies can include banks, credit card companies, and other financial institutions. Thus, if an entity seeks to send payment electronically, it may request or allow an associated payment company to transfer payment to a payee.
More recently, payment gateways have emerged as mechanisms to facilitate electronic payments. These payment gateways may receive bank account, credit card, or other payment information from end users seeking to use the payment gateway for electronic transactions. During a specific transaction, an end user may seek to send payment to a vendor or another receiving party, and may authorize the payment gateway to send such payment on the end user's behalf. The payment gateway may simultaneously withdraw the payment from the end user's bank account, credit card, or other source of payment, and then provide the payment to the receiving party.
A principal advantage of such a service is that the end user need not provide any financial information directly to the receiving party, with whom the end user may not have a pre-existing relationship. However, this system cannot be used by end users without bank accounts, credit cards, or similar electronic financial instruments, such as those who rely solely or largely on physical cash for completing transactions.
A need in the art therefore exists for a system that overcomes one or more of the above-described limitations.